The NYPL Channel

Wales Week 2009: Owen Sheers and Paul Watkins in Discussion—March 5, 2009

In celebration of Wales Week in New York, prominent Welsh novelists Owen Sheers and Paul Watkins will be in discussion with The New York Public Library’s David Ferriero as they discuss their careers. Owen Sheers is the winner of an Eric Gregory Award and the 1999 Vogue Young Writer’s Award; his first collection of poetry, The Blue Book (Seren, 2000), was short-listed for the Welsh Book of the Year and the Forward Prize Best 1st Collection 2001. Owen’s first novel, Resistance (Faber, 2008) won a 2008 Hospital Club Creative Award and was short-listed for the Writers Guild Best Book Award. Owen’s recent collaboration with composer Rachel Portman, The Water Diviner’s Tale, an oratorio for children, was premiered at the Royal Albert Hall for the BBC Proms 2007. His novels Calm at Sunset, won Britain’s Encore Prize for best second novel, and Archangel won the 1996 Holtby Prize from the Royal Society of Literature. He is regularly compared to Hemingway and Conrad and his books have been translated into nine languages.

Click here to listen to the event (.mp3, 1hr, 12min)